2014 F1 season

Lotus say it may take until the Spanish Grand Prix for them to unlock the potential of their E22 chassis.

The team endured a tough opening weekend in Australia, covering only a small number of laps during practice and failing to get either of their cars to the finish.

The team’s technical director Nick Chester said it was difficult to tell how quickly they would progress having covered so little mileage so far. “I’m certainly hoping for an improvement for Malaysia and then some more in Bahrain,” he said, “although as they are back to back it is likely to be small steps”.

“It may well be Barcelona before we are in a more stable position and compete at the level we want to be at. One thing’s for certain, we’re not sitting back; we’re pushing all the way with the focus on extracting the maximum from the E22.”

However he believes the team can make quick gains once they’ve solved some of the car’s niggling problems. “From what we have seen on the chassis in terms of measurements, particularly on the aero side, it still looks very strong.”

“There is nothing fundamental on the car that will stop it being competitive but we need to get to a sufficient level of mapping and operating the car so that the drivers can extract the maximum from the E22.

“There are clear, identifiable areas where we can find big chunks of time. Once we have more mileage under our belt and worked on the balance of the car then the drivers will feel more comfortable and we will make good progress.”

Software problems were the main causes of difficult for the team in Australia, he said, “the fixes for which can be quite time consuming”.

“Worse than that, they can be time consuming at the most inopportune times over a race weekend. That said, we left Australia with some key directions including a deeper understanding of the energy management and how we need to optimise it.”

Huhm i think Lotus are fine u no with their ace driver Gro lets not kid ourselves he was dominant over Kimi at end, Kimi is on way out u can tell u just see it he does not have natural speed anymore.

Give me Gro over Kimi anyday these days. I dont even rate Gro as higly as others but man, Alo would have won the title with that thing, look at it this way is Gro as good as Vettel? No is the answer well how quick would that car been i he could be only guy hanging onto the Bulls. It had best tyre wear by a mile, Nando would have had a field day. Same with Hamilton imagine Ham in a car with decent tyres lol, talk about a guy who as been done over by Pirreli’s

@austus – But those remarks were made at the early stages of the Quantum negotiations, probably before they realized Ijaz was a crook, and once that deal did fall through you can hardly blame Lotus for taking Maldonado in that it was a financial necessity. If you want someone to blame for Hulkenberg not going to Lotus then blame the FIA or CVC for distributing over a billion dollars of revenue that F1 makes annually anywhere but the teams that need it.

I really hold the view that Lotus lost their way mid-way through 2013 when it became apparent that they had significant money issues. They then started to lose key individuals like Kimi and Boullier, and quite a few others as well. That was the sign of things to come in 2014. Looking back when Hulkenberg was looking for a drive, he was smart enough to know that Lotus might end up like this. Maldonado who has never had a money problem in his career must be wondering why his team are struggling.